


You Won't (Not Again)

by MajorEnglishEsquire



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Human Castiel, M/M, Near Death Experience, Supernatural Season 07, Team Free Will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-25
Updated: 2013-03-25
Packaged: 2017-12-06 10:07:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/734460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MajorEnglishEsquire/pseuds/MajorEnglishEsquire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just as Sam feels the wet skin and bones of Dean slip out from under his hands, bleeding too much to stop, the universe coughs Castiel back out onto the old factory floor</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Won't (Not Again)

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own the rights to these characters, setting, show, etc. No harm intended. Original posting [here](http://supastarla.livejournal.com/17951.html).
> 
> Takes place some time after [07.05 Shut Up, Dr. Phil](http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=7.05_Shut_Up,_Dr._Phil) (goes AU).

Dean is about to die. The smell of blood swells in the back of Sam's throat and his molars clench, holding back a sob. And just as the tears begin to break from his eyes, just as he feels the wet skin and bones of Dean slip out from under his hands, bleeding too much to stop, the universe coughs Castiel back out on the old factory floor.

Sam doesn't see it happen. He does feel the crackle of a presence but anything strong as an angel, thrumming with fresh anti-Winchester rage, can damn well fucking take him at this moment. There is a silent while, Sam's wet gasping and Dean's quiet dying, before there's a hand on each of Sam's shoulders and he is removed from his brother's side.

He gets thrown back a bit and leans on his hands watching someone who can only be Cas curve over his brother's body and begin miracling.

Castiel folds his hands, fingers interlaced, over the gaping wound and Dean begins to knit back together. It's imperfect but it's alright. When Cas scoops blood out of the way the flesh is mending, the skin going from pale to gold again, the bones no longer visible. His fingers fumble the shreds of t-shirt back over Dean's body and he falls back on his ass, breathing steady and disbelieving, unknowingly mimicking Sam Winchester a few feet away.

Castiel curls forward again, slowly and methodically checks Dean's vitals.

Touches the skin of his neck, wrist, chest, lips.

He'll be okay, but the life did leave him a little bit. It might be a while before he's conscious.

Now he turns to Sam and all Sam's trying to figure out is how this happened, because Cas looks just as surprised as Sam feels that he's even existing right now. Sam tries to think. He stares at the air filling and leaving Dean's living chest in tiny breaths. Did he command Castiel to appear somehow? Did Castiel just know? Is something out there trying to protect Dean?

What was he thinking, right before the buzz of presence whipped up his spine? That if any archangel suddenly roared into existence behind him, shivved him, killed him good and fast, he’d be back with Dean any moment. Dean would be in there, in Sam's afterlife. Dean and Dad and Mom and Jess and Cas and Jo and Ellen and. It was an assumption. He didn't even know which direction he'd earned by now, Up or Down.

Cas finally looks directly at him. He looks like he fears for his life a little bit. Like he is glad to see Sam and all, but he knows he has another thing coming.

Sam only swallows and gets his feet under him.

"Help me get him back to the car," he says, as he moves to scoop up Dean, in passing just sort of dazedly pats Cas on the shoulder.

«»

Cas is in the passenger seat. He's inspecting himself. Hands and jacket. Nose and tie. Arms and ears. He's all back.

Sam comes back out of the rusted factory doors and hauls their gear into the Impala's trunk. The weapons get stowed down and hidden, and as he goes to leave the duffle atop it, he spots the stained old tan trench, folded away and crushed into a corner of the trunk. Sam reels the length of it out and re-folds it.

He circles the car the long way to get in. He hands the coat off to Cas and goes round to the driver's side. Castiel stares at the jacket in his lap. He gets up on his knees in the seat, reaches into the back, and lifts Dean's head to place it there under him. Sam doesn't comment because he doesn't know if it's cruel or not. He doesn't know what Dean will think when he wakes up.

Just the thought that he will wake up chokes Sam with tears again. He holds on to that. He claps Cas's shoulder again as he turns back around to sit. Cas nods only once. Sam starts the car.

«»

They're only five minutes from the motel when Dean jostles awake on a bump in the road. He moans a little. "Sam?"

"Right here," Sam says. "You good?"

"Drive like a friggin maniac."

"Yeah," Sam says. "Sorry."

He's guessing Dean doesn't open his eyes. Castiel doesn't add anything.

Sam doesn't back into the parking spot because he's crap at backing in and that's just one more thing Dean doesn't need to bitch about right now.

He opens the back to help Dean out. Dean sits up, though, and finally cracks open his eyes, and there's his angel, still in the front seat.

Dean rubs his eyes, thumbs some of the tension from his clenched jaw.

Then his hand falls to his chest.

He looks down at himself, where his ribs aren't splintering out of the flesh, where his lungs are intact beneath the skin. His shirt is a bloody waste and there's barely a mark left to explain why. He looks back up at Castiel.

"Sam. Ah." He looks to his brother. "Gimme a minute."

Sam’s eyes flash to Cas, so Dean knows he's there, not an illusion. "Yeah," Sam nods, steps away, and goes to open up the room. Dean is still reading Sam's face while he walks away. All tight lines of relief and death still kind of floating around, haunting his eyes.

Dean feels himself breathe and remembers the last moments he can recall before waking in the car. The tan trench is on the seat beside him.

Cas is trying not to stare at him, like, actively trying not to. He's sitting to the side, looking out the driver's side window. Gaze turned away from all the math Dean's doing in his head.

Dean sits forward and palms the side of Cas's face until he looks at him.

"I don't know where, or—or how, Dean, I—," it floods out of him a second before he clenches his mouth shut again, lips a thin line of concern.

Dean's hand curves into his hair and brings his head over the seatback so Dean can press his lips to Castiel's head. Cas's hand finds the back of his neck. He counts dozens of exhales, Dean's precious life breathed against his brow. Dean listens to Cas, too.

Castiel never performs another act of angel mojo. Not from choice, but lack of it. He probably shouldn't even have been able to save Dean's life, but then again, he probably shouldn't have popped back into existence, either.

From what they can tell, he came back completely human. One day an angel even shows up to confirm as much. No one knows how any of this happened.

It frightens some, both enemies and allies, emboldens others. Sam, Dean, Cas, they decide not to question it too deeply, simply set to tying their paths close together. Dean and Castiel make new efforts never to leave each others' side in life. It is another step in realizing Sam’s near-final vision for his brother and himself and their whole family. Their new hunt is a course set to ensure that not even death will part them.


End file.
